Field of Invention
The present invention relates generally to providing self-care recommendations to a person experiencing a change in environmental conditions, and more particularly, to provide such recommendations based in part on the person's unique health profile.
Related Art
Environmental conditions have long been known to affect human health. Extreme weather such as hurricanes, tornados, and floods are most commonly associated with threats to human life yet more common and subtle environmental conditions have a significant impact on human health, especially for people suffering from chronic diseases.
Human adaptation to a changing climate system is essential for promoting healthy and productive societies. Since our adaptation capacity is a function of age, health condition, and also the rate of environmental change, there is a need to inform individuals on how to thrive amid current shifts in our planet's fluid systems (e.g., climate, weather, and water). It is known that these systems are in state of unusual imbalance due to both natural and anthropogenic influences. Based on physics, these inputs into the system can generate more frequent and/or intense extreme weather events (e.g., excessive heat or cold temperatures, lower cloud levels that trap pollutants, rise in algal blooms, etc) in order to restore balance within Earth's fluid bodies. With the driving force of planetary dynamics being balance, the more disequilibrium that is present in a system means that there will be more restoring forces (e.g., extreme or anomalous weather) in order to bring about that balance.
The balance restoring force manifests as weather, which today is changing on time and space scales that humans have not yet experienced. During previous climatic shifts, humans were able to migrate away from such changes, lacked a protective built environment (e.g., heated or air conditioned homes) and their environmental changes tended to be more gradual in onset. Today, we live in non-migratory societies where we are subject balancing forces. Healthy individuals can take up to a decade to adapt to seasonal shifts, so when they travel or move to a new location it will take time to acclimate to the new environment. Chronically ill individuals have more challenges to adaptation because the range of environmental supports (e.g., clean air, mild temperatures, etc) are lacking.